


Expeditious

by Stairre



Series: Resonance [6]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bounty Hunting, Don't copy to another site, F/F, Implied/Referenced Dystopian Society, Implied/Referenced Prostitution, M/M, My boys are making friends I'm so proud of them, Possessive Behavior, Racing, There are no good guys in war, as in the characters go out to socially drink, me on my way to do more worldbuilding like ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-16 22:34:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29339886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stairre/pseuds/Stairre
Summary: Fact one: Erbe - the colony on the moon of the same name orbiting Cam O'ek - has a racing circuit. Fact two: Deadlock has never gone racing, not properly. Fact three: Hot Rod finds the second fact an untenable situation that must be remedied immediately.---Or: Hot Rod and Deadlock goon a dateracing, the boys make a pair of friends, and the author continues to go feral with the original worldbuilding.
Relationships: Drift | Deadlock/Hot Rod, Original Female Character/Original Female Character
Series: Resonance [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1843339
Comments: 11
Kudos: 33





	Expeditious

**Resonance**

**Expeditious**

–

“Oh, hey, look,” Hot Rod says, flicking through the leaflets on the side of the bar, twisting in his stool to wave one at Deadlock. “Erbe has racetracks!”

Deadlock glances at the colourful leaflet Hot Rod is waving in his face, licks his fingers clean of the sticky sweetness lingering on them from the dessert he’s holding, and takes it, his translation software parsing through the half-familiar letters of Kyga and Cam O’ek’s shared alphabet. He’s got a pretty good amount of data already for the spoken language, but his written is lagging a bit behind.

They’re on Erbe, one of Cam O’ek’s moons – the other is Yuna – and it’s the one that has the mixed colony of Cam-Okeo and Kygons living on it.

Walking through Erbe is not quite a blast from the past, but there is something hauntingly familiar about the stalls lining the streets serving mechanoid commodities and products, the shops advertising paint jobs and tune-ups, and the way that the gleam of armour plates is common enough to go unremarked. Hot Rod and Deadlock still attract a couple of looks every now and then, for they are very obviously not Kygons, the most common mechanoid species in the area, but none of those looks are hostile, just curious.

They’re sitting at a street stall, on bar stools near the counter, with sweet dessert balls on sticks in their hands. Neither of them recognise the type of sweets they are, save that they’re almost but not quite like a very light energon goodie, but there are a variety available, and they’ve been sitting here working their way through the menu for over an hour, just enjoying themselves, and also most assuredly ruining their appetite for later. The Kygons’ diet, as a mechanical species, is not too different from the Cybertronians’, their fuels and coolants and such processable by Hot Rod and Deadlock’s systems.

The Kygon behind the bar is friendly, the bio-lights on her cheeks gleaming softly, and she’s intuitive enough that when her initial curious questions about Cybertron got dodged, she’s gracefully avoided asking any more. Deadlock’s already planning to give the mech a nice tip.

“Oh, yes,” the Kygon says at Hot Rod’s words, “we have the Erbe Racing Circuit, out by the southern outskirts. They’re mostly practice and training tracks for the racers, though we do hold some smaller local tournaments. You’d have to go to Kyga for the bigger ones. You interested?”

Hot Rod hums. “They open for public use, or do you have to know a guy who knows a guy?” he asks.

The Kygon’s bio-lights swirl into a thoughtful silver. “I think there are sessions open for booking, if you want to have a go,” she says slowly. “But – I don’t think your systems would be compatible with the speedsters, they’re designed with Kygons in mind.” She frowns. “Sorry.”

Hot Rod grins and Deadlock chuckles a little.

“Probably not,” Hot Rod agrees, “but we don’t need to be compatible with the racing vehicles there. _We_ are the racers.”

The Kygon’s optics flicker on and off, and her bio-lights darken into a confused blue-purple. “I don’t understand,” she says.

Hot Rod slips off the stool, glances about to make sure he has room, and then transforms, folding down into his alt mode. _That_ draws some stares.

“Oh, my,” says the Kygon, leaning over the counter to look at Hot Rod.

“See?” Hot Rod says, turning his tyres slightly before transforming back. “We won’t have trouble.” He turns to Deadlock. “Please can we look into booking a session?” he asks. “I haven’t had a chance to race for _millennia –_ and I wanna race next to you. C’mon, jus’ you, me, an’ the tracks. We’d have a right laugh.”

It’s deeper than that, of course. For racer frames like them, racing together has some pretty big social connotations: it’s pretty much how racers make friends. All of Hot Rod’s pre-war companions had been either racers, entertainers, or both, at least before he expanded into the resistance. But – Rodion hadn’t had racetracks. It had been a pit of squalor; of factories and mines and slums.

Hot Rod doesn’t know if Deadlock’s ever had a chance to race on tracks, to be _invited_ to race with another, but – if this is the first time, then he wants to give Deadlock what belongs to him as a racer, something special that he very well might have been denied so far.

“I – had heard that your kind are known as _Transformers,”_ the Kygon says softly. “I – what is it like? Does it hurt?”

Deadlock shakes his head. “Not at all,” he answers, “it just feels – natural.”

Hot Rod smiles. “Yeah,” he agrees, nodding, “an’ we can get restless if we don’t get to transform often enough. Like an itch you need to scratch. Transforming feels good, like, I don’t know, like you’ve got a stiff piston an’ you stretch in just the right way that it slides properly? Like that, but without any pain before hand, jus’ the _oh, that felt good_ bit.”

“Huh,” the Kygon says, looking them up and down, her optics lingering on the parts of their frames that have obvious alt mode features, like the tyres in Deadlock’s elbows and the exhaust pipes clasping around Hot Rod’s legs. “So I guess racing is something you mechs know a lot about?”

Deadlock hums. “Hot Rod more than me, at least for official stuff,” he says. “He actually raced on Cybertron’s tracks.”

Hot Rod absorbs that silently – yep, he was right. Deadlock’s been deprived of feeling the glorious burn in his wheels when it’s not been a battlefield he’s been zipping through. The tracks were dangerous, make no doubt about it, but – there’s a difference, between that and dodging bombs and laser-fire and ramming into enemy soldiers. Deadlock should get to just _enjoy_ stretching his tyres without the fear of death all around him, and Hot Rod intends to enjoy it, too. It _has_ been a while.

“It’s by the southern outskirts, you said?” Hot Rod asks, even as he picks up the leaflet again to flip through it and try to find the address.

The Kygon nods. “Yes,” she says. “The main market area goes north to south, so if you just keep walking out the bottom entrance then you’ll be somewhere in the right direction. Sorry, I don’t know much more than that.”

Deadlock waves her off. “No, no,” he says, “that’s helpful, thank you.”

Hot Rod finishes eating his sticky dessert ball thing as he shuffles through the flyer, Deadlock hashing out the bill with the Kygon, and then they leave, letting her begin to shut away her business.

It’s getting to be late afternoon on Erbe, and a lot of the shops and stalls are beginning to close. Not all of them, of course, but enough that the streets are going quiet, and Hot Rod’s beginning to feel that itch in his spoiler wings to get back inside himself, now that the crowd’s not as thick to hide their presence easier. Logic tells him they’re safe, but – hard-earnt instincts have him wanting to duck inside the _Luminary_ once more, behind the thick hull walls, the shields, the guns, and there’s not a lot he can do about that.

The two of them wander their way back to the docks where the _Luminary_ is, and it would be easier to drive, but the slow way is nice, too. The infinitesimal weight of the small collection of leaflets in Hot Rod’s subspace lingers in his mind.

–

Deadlock takes a sip from his cube as he reads through the leaflets Hot Rod left on the small low table the previous evening, in what is probably not known as a rec room on a ship this small but he can’t think of another word for it. They’re detailing the limited amount of attractions Erbe has: the market two days of the week, the theatre/cinema combo, the tracks, two museums, and a leisure centre. Erbe’s not that big, and most tourists will go down farther to Cam O’ek, but there are enough passing through – and the locals besides – that these places seem to do well enough.

Deadlock traces a finger through the timetable telling him what’s on at the theatre/cinema – by the tiny floor plan, there’s the stage in one wing and the screen in another, but they’re both in the same building – before flipping to the address and comm number of the Erbe Racing Circuit. He reads their holo address and inputs it into the tablet he and Hot Rod have linked up to Erbe and Cam O’ek’s planetary holo-net.

As he’s scrolling through their holo-site, his optics fall on the leaflet that details the theatre’s schedule. He’s not as interested in the cinema side, he’s seen plenty of holo-films, but – he’s never sat and watched a show. He doesn’t know if Hot Rod has, or if it’s something that’s been denied to him, too. He’s seen _recordings_ of some, but the Dead End’s local entertainment was kind of limited to oil houses you wouldn’t want to sit down in for fear of catching an infection on the seats and whatever they might have playing on a screen on the wall. Maybe, if you were lucky, you might catch someone playing an instrument in the corner, trying to eke out their own living, but – nothing more than that.

“Mornin’,” Hot Rod says, yawning, as he steps into the room, his own cube in hand. He takes the seat next to Deadlock on the sofa, unseals his cube, and takes a gulp from it before he registers the tablet balanced on Deadlock’s lap. “What’cha lookin’ at?”

Deadlock tilts the screen so Hot Rod can see, raising his arm in a silent invitation. Hot Rod scoots into the space and tucks himself into Deadlock’s side, reading the short description of the Erbe Racing Circuit’s history. Deadlock’s arm settles on Hot Rod’s back, fingers curled around the top edge of one of his spoiler wings, stroking gently.

“We’ve got a few days left on the docking placement,” Deadlock says. “We could see if they have any slots free on that short a notice.”

Hot Rod’s optics are half-shuttered, even as they brighten at the influx of the fuel he’s sipping. “That would be nice,” he says, rolling a wave of lazy contentment through his EM field and over Deadlock. “Sorry,” he says, “jus’ tired. I know I was more excited about this yesterday.”

“Nightmares?” Deadlock asks, gentle, running the pad of his finger over the leading edge of the spoiler.

Hot Rod shakes his head. “Restless,” he answers. “Didn’t drop into recharge for hours. Hope I didn’t wake you, I tried to dampen the bond so I wouldn’t.”

Deadlock makes a negative hum. “Didn’t feel anything,” he says.

“Good, good,” Hot Rod says, leaning forward to put his cube down on the table. “So – racing. You up for it?”

Deadlock nods. “I would – like to race with you,” he says, honestly. He _knows_ that it’s a thing his own frame type does, but Rodion just hadn’t had tracks, and next to no racer frames. He’s never had to test these particular cobbled-together skills against another before, especially in a friendly competition, but already the thought of his engine’s pistons pumping hard and fast as his tyres burn on the road, pushing himself faster and faster, and Hot Rod right next to him doing the same, their EM fields flickering against each other depending on how close they get… Yeah, even just the thought of it is enticing, in a way that non-racers probably wouldn’t understand.

Hot Rod grins at his answer, a slight tension Deadlock hadn’t even realised was there leaving him. “Let’s give them a call, then.”

–

They manage to nab a slot in the evening on the very last day of their pre-paid docking placement. The Kygon on the other end of the comm warns them that there’ll be less people there, and that if any of the vehicles from earlier in the day need repairs and checks then they’ll run the risk of not being able to use them or having less to choose from, but that’s fine by both of them. All they need is the circuit itself.

They arrive, sign in, graciously ignore the slight staring the mech behind the counter is doing at their strange – to his optics – frames, and eventually get directed to the circuit and the pair of Kygons waiting there in a few short minutes.

One of the Kygons is a lovely pink-orange colour, like a sunset, and her helm is decorated with her species’ empathic bio-lights in elegant rays from her optics, four sensory horns stretching out to complete the rays. The other is a study in various shades of blue, and she has long and thin sensory fins curling down either side of her helm, many-jointed and flexing as they rest on her shoulders and sway over her front as she shifts her weight in place, each tipped with a large bio-light glowing somewhere near her abdomen.

“Hey,” the first Kygon smiles, her bio-lights gleaming a welcoming orange, “welcome to Erbe Racing Circuit! My name is Torsk, and I’m one of your supervisors for this evening.” She gestures to her companion. “This is my wife Yennu, your other supervisor.” She looks them up and down, optics catching on the tyres on their pedes, and headlights on their chests. “Your names?”

“Fireglow,” Hot Rod says, giving the false names they use, “and this is Quickdraw.” Cam O’ek knows they’re false, but pretty much all bounty hunters go by pseudonyms, and Hot Rod and Deadlock are no different. There are procedures in place for that kind of thing, here.

Torsk nods, glances them up and down again, and asks after a moment, “Sorry if I’m being rude, but – are you Transformers? Or Cyber – Cyberter…Cybertass… sorry, the other term.” She cringes a little to herself.

“Cybertronian,” Hot Rod clarifies, unoffended, even smiling a little. “And, yes, we are.”

Torsk scans over their frames again. “And you… transform into – cars of some kind? By the looks of some of your parts.”

“Racers,” Deadlock says. “We call the parts of our frames that are aesthetical or part of our alt modes _kibble,_ if you want to know.”

Torsk nods slowly as she glances them over, turns her head to look at the circuit, before her optics meet theirs again. “We tend to keep the tracks simple for guests,” she says, “maybe a couple of low ramps if they prove they have enough skill, but we don’t put up anything more complicated in terms of obstacles. Legal stuff, you know.”

“That’s fine,” Hot Rod says. “Just the opportunity to stretch our axles will be enough. Going top speed on the roads isn’t exactly legal.”

Torsk smiles and Yennu huffs a breathy laugh, nearly completely silent.

“Starting line’s over there,” Yennu says quietly, pointing. “We’ll get these speedsters out your way, since you’re not going to be using them. Have fun, we’ll be in the stands in case anything goes wrong.”

“Thanks,” Hot Rod says, and the tips of Yennu’s long fins curl, bio-lights gleaming a friendly yellow. She nods, gives a small smile, and says nothing, walking forward to help Torsk get the two unneeded speedsters out of the tracks.

Deadlock scans the vehicles over as they do, curious. They’re open-top, low to the ground, and he can see connection ports lining the space where the mech would sit. Assumedly, the mech would connect their systems with the speedster’s, and the vehicle would become an extension of themselves. Deadlock can even see wide flat sensors along the front and sides that would presumably link up into a visual feed, smaller proximity sensors surrounding them in rings.

It’s certainly a little alien to his optics, but hardly out of the realm of technology he’s already familiar with, if put into an unfamiliar configuration. Vehicles – that weren’t shuttles, ships, or large transports – were rare on Cybertron, for obvious reasons. Haulers and transporters were some of the most common frame types to be commissioned and cold constructed – and, consequently, some of the mecha most likely to suffer from frame dysphoria.

Erbe Racing Circuit is actually two circuits – there’s a larger one with multiple curves and a non-standard shape, which is clearly the primary track for actual races, and a simple oval one off to the side. Deadlock and Hot Rod have been lead to the oval one, likely for legal reasons. That’s fine, Deadlock doesn’t care, just as long as he gets to stretch his tyres and give his engine a real work-out. He hadn’t realised how much he missed whipping through battlefields until he wasn’t doing it any longer… well, maybe not the _battlefield_ part as such, but the dangerous speed part definitely scratched an itch, and he’s eager to push his frame to its limits once more.

When the track is clear, Hot Rod and Deadlock walk over to the starting line. Deadlock trails his optics along the ground, observing the painted lines he’s seen many times on the holo-news but never in real life. The line is staggered, since the circuit is basically a giant oval, and it’s split into ten lanes.

Deadlock takes the fourth lane from the middle and Hot Rod takes the fifth, putting him right in Deadlock’s sights. He turns, grins, waves, and transforms down, folding into his alt mode. Deadlock can see his triple barrel exhaust pipes encasing each of his sides, ready to pull the energon fumes away from his mate’s engine – Hot Rod naturally produces a lot of heat, and with it an increased amount of fumes, so it’s no wonder he was forged with the excess piping to keep his systems safe.

Deadlock follows his spark-mate’s lead and transforms. He’s bigger than Hot Rod, in both forms, but he knows their engines are equally powerful. Hot Rod has to compensate for his unusually hot engines, but Deadlock has more weight to drag around, so he thinks they’re about evenly matched. Hot Rod’s raced on circuits before, but Deadlock cut his denta on battlefields… though the tracks could be dangerous, too, as _speed_ was hardly the only thing tested on them…

These thoughts slip away as Torsk comes up to the side, holds up an arm, and says, “Ready?”

Hot Rod rumbles his engine loud. “On three!” he answers.

Deadlock doesn’t say anything, but he copies Hot Rod and growls his primed engine.

Torsk counts, “Three… two… one… _go!”_ and swipes her arm down, the bio-lights lining her forearm flashing a bright and eager red.

Both Deadlock and Hot Rod lurch forward in a cloud of dust and fumes, engines revving, then rumbling down into a smooth purr. Deadlock thinks he catches a flash of shock from their observers’ EM fields as he and Hot Rod wing around the first corner much faster than they were expecting. Cybertronian racers _are_ some of the fastest sentients on land, and seekers some of the fastest in the sky in-atmo. It’s been a long time since their kind has been able to take pride in that, in dominating mecha sporting events, but – ah, it doesn’t really matter anymore, does it? If they ever will again, and be known for that instead of war… it’s a long while away.

It’s not really a race as such, not at first. The two of them whip around the simple oval circuit next to each other, their EM fields practically merged at the edges, looping vibrations and excitement through, sharing in the exhilarating rush that’s buzzing through their systems. Base coding instincts purr with pleasure as they loop around the track, a fundamental need of their racer frames being met as they pick up speed, still matching each other.

Deadlock can see Torsk and Yennu safely ensconced in the stands as he and his spark-mate whip around the track, once, twice, thrice, getting faster and faster as they go. Oh, sure, he could have gone immediately to top speed, but though he knows they’ll race for real sooner or later, there’s an unfamiliar pleasure thrumming through him at speeding along next to Hot Rod, just that act in itself. Deadlock can’t say he’s ever had friends who’ve shared his frame type, and – it’s nice, really nice, to share this enjoyment with someone else. Unfamiliar, of course, but no less magnificent.

His HUD pings with an incoming call on his and Hot Rod’s private comm channel as the two of them begin their fourth lap.

_/ Hey, /_ Hot Rod sends, and though he doesn’t have a face right now, Deadlock can still hear the grin in his voice. _/ Wanna start actually racing when we start the next lap? /_

_/ If you think you can keep up, /_ Deadlock sends back immediately.

Hot Rod laughs, loud and exhilarated, across the comm and echoing it in his vocaliser, the sound whipped away by the wind, the barest snatch caught by Deadlock’s audios. _/ That a_ _ **challenge?**_ _/_ he asks. _/ C’mon, let’s bet: I win an’ you hafta –_ _have to_ _– er – /_

_/ I have to what? /_ Deadlock teases. _/ Buy the first round? We share a bank account, Roddy. /_

Hot Rod groans in annoyance, and they start their fifth lap without making it a competition. The track beneath their tyres is in good condition, and there aren’t any obstacles set up, though there is a light layer of dust that’s kicked up in their wake, from many long hours of speedsters zooming through, picking it up and then settling it back down. It’s nothing compared to battlefield fumes, they barely register it, and neither have their vents sealed.

_/ How about this, /_ Deadlock proposes, _/ loser has to do the manual recoding for the old navi-computer that we’ve been putting off. /_

_/ Ugghh! /_ Hot Rod moans. _/ That’s **cruel,** / _he laments. _/ Inputting all the updated star-maps an’ coding in a proper interaction with ’em will take **days.** / _They whip around the last corner and begin to approach the starting line again. _/ Okay, fine. Three laps. Loser does the navi-comp coding. Hope you’re ready to eat dust! /_

Deadlock would grin if he had a mouth to grin with right now. The two of them pick up a little bit more speed, EM fields going tense with concentration, folding in close to their frames – and then they’re past the line, and the race begins.

Hot Rod’s six exhaust pipes spew licks of flames behind him as he shoots ahead, scorching the tracks and searing through the air. They’re not enough to compromise Deadlock’s armour – it would be poor armour indeed if it buckled at the barest flame, unfit to stand up to laser fire or even atmospheric re-entry – but they startle him. They don’t quite cause him to stall his engine, for he has far too much experience having to adjust for changeable battlefield situations to do something like _stall,_ but – they still surprise him.

Deadlock revs his engine, loud, and picks up speed. Hot Rod gained himself a brief lead at the start, but now it’s _on._ The two of them whip around the first bend, dust billowing into the air from the tracks, both of them drifting slightly, though not as much as the vehicles that these tracks usually see would do.

Once, Deadlock had been named – had named himself – for his ability to control his own drifting, turn what would be a frightening, if thrilling, moment of lesser control into his signature skill. It’s been a long time since then, but it’s not like that ability has abandoned him in the intervening millennia. Hot Rod drifts more, Deadlock drifts less, and he pulls into the lead.

They race down the straight, Hot Rod gaining a little, ‘til they’re neck and neck again. Hot Rod’s a bit faster, Deadlock thinks, has less frame weight to drag… but Hot Rod has to slow down a bit on the approach to the next bend. Deadlock pulls ahead again, drifting in a perfect arc around the curve, confident and unafraid, and back onto the next straight, Hot Rod right on his tail lights and gaining.

The circuit is a simple oval, and the starting line is about two-thirds of the way down this straight. The two of them fly over it at roughly the same time, too close to tell, and Deadlock’s sensors snatch up a glimpse of Torsk and Yennu, watching them enthralled. Then they’re gone, and it’s the first bend again. As before, Deadlock takes the lead with his drifting skills, and Hot Rod catches up on the straight.

Round and round they go, finishing the second lap neck and neck again, and then whipping around the circuit on their third. The track is smoking a little, under the heat of Hot Rod’s flames, but it’s not on fire, and will hopefully stay that way. Deadlock honestly doesn’t know who’s going to win this race, they’re so evenly matched when all is taken into account…

And then they’re over the line for the final time, and both of them silently agree to slow down, looping around the circuit just once more, slower, their tyres burning and their engines purring, dust settling onto the tracks and Hot Rod’s flames sputtering out as he decreases his speed enough for his engine to stop producing them. They turn the bend, come trailing up the final straight again, and come to a halt at the line, Torsk and Yennu clambering down from the stands and coming out to meet them.

“That was amazing!” Torsk shouts with a grin, vaulting the low wall at the base of the stands and coming up next to them. Yennu nods behind her, following a bit more sedately, but her helm fins’ bio-lights flash bright as they portray her own excitement.

“Do you know who won?” Hot Rod asks, transforming, his tyres lightly smoking. He’s got a grin on his face, his optics are edging towards white with how bright they are, and his EM field is purring like his engine. “We were so close, I couldn’t tell!”

Deadlock transforms as well, coming up to stand next to his mate. Exhilaration is still humming through his frame, and he loops his hand around to grip Hot Rod’s hip and pull him into his side in a public display of affection he usually shies from. Hot Rod’s EM field crashes into his own unashamedly, and his mate tilts his head back to beam at him.

“Draw,” Yennu proclaims quietly after a moment. “We don’t have the cameras set up recording, and it was very close. I couldn’t tell you who was in front, and it wouldn’t have been by more than a couple of inches. Draw, then, for all intents and purposes.”

Hot Rod sighs theatrically. “Guess we’ll have to do the recoding together, then, hm?” he says to Deadlock.

Deadlock sighs – less theatrically – and kisses the top of Hot Rod’s helm. “We will,” he says, not looking forward to the task, but – it won’t be as bad, if he’s doing it next to Hot Rod. He then lifts his face to Torsk and Yennu. “Did the track suffer any fire damage?” he asks, and Hot Rod winces in the corner of his peripheral.

Torsk shakes her head. “No, it’ll be fine. It’s meant to stand up to heat and friction, though actual flames that aren’t coming from a wreck are new. No harm done.”

Hot Rod vents out in relief. “Good,” he smiles. “Now, how much longer have we got in this slot? I think we’re nearing the end.”

Deadlock checks his chronometer at his spark-mate’s words, and, yeah, what do you know, their slot is almost up and the tracks are sidling ever closer to their closing time. Time flies when you’re having fun, he guesses. And he has. He has had fun.

Torsk raises her arm in front of her, flipping open a panel on her forearm and peering into what must be a display screen of some kind. The Kygons must not have an internal HUD set-up in the same way that the Cybertronians do. “You’re right,” she says. “About ten more minutes left. Enough time for another couple of laps, I think.”

Deadlock rolls his shoulder pauldrons, listens to the gears click, and considers the buzzing warmth of his engine, the contentedness in his EM field, and says, “Hot Rod?”

Hot Rod hums, glances back to the track, and says, “I think we’ll just sit around an’ cool off a little. We’re racers – we get excited an’ lose track of time. Let’s leave it on a high note.”

Torsk nods and says, “Lemme just shut some stuff down here. Yennu will take you back to reception.” She shoots a look at her wife, her bio-lights flashing in a pattern that neither Deadlock nor Hot Rod can decipher, and Yennu nods with a small smile on her face. Torsk grins at them, no guile on her face or in her EM field, and walks off to the side, ducking into a maintenance door in the stands.

Yennu nods towards the tunnel cutting through the bottom of the stands, leading back to the main building attached to the back – or is this side of the stands attached to the main building? It’s much the same, really, and she leads them back through.

Inside, after they’ve signed off at the reception desk, confirming that no damage was done, to them or the tracks, Yennu scrawling her signature last on the data-pad and handing it back over, Yennu turns to them, her long helm fins twitching where they trail down her chest.

“There’s a nice oil house down the east-south wall,” she says quietly, catching their attention. “Torsk and I would like to invite you to drinks, if that is amenable.”

Hot Rod blinks in surprise, but – it’s a pleasant surprise. He glances at Deadlock before he answers, “We’re not – disinterested. Where is it? Its name?”

Yennu pings them with an address, and says, “It’s called _The Light Spear._ After Erbe and her weapon.”

Hot Rod goes to ask what she means, but Torsk walks into the room at that point, joining their little group with a pleased grin, and the moment passes.

“Hey!” she says, her EM field brushing over Yennu’s, though politely avoiding theirs. “Got the invite? You up for drinks?”

“We are,” Deadlock confirms, certain that it’s probably more curiosity at another mechanoid species that has the pair inviting them for a night out, but there’s no meanness behind it, and he can’t deny he’s curious, too. The Kygons are still mostly unknown to him and Hot Rod, after all, and if Torsk and Yennu are going through the effort to get to know he and Hot Rod a little better, then they’re unlikely to be surprised or offended at return questions. “Right now, or later?”

Torsk glances across to the fading light streaming in the wide front windows. “Now?” she suggests. “If it’s convenient. You’ll be out by the docks, right? Or in one of the hotels. It’s a bit of a trek to go all that way and then come back, but it’s up to you.”

Hot Rod plucks the spark-bond, a quick check-in to ensure Deadlock’s okay with the current course of events – he is – before he says, “Now is fine. It’s our last evening on Erbe anyway, we leave dock tomorrow. Might as well go out for a night.”

Torsk makes a small cheer, her bio-lights brightening. “Don’t worry,” she says, “it’ll be a good one.”

–

It’s almost full dark by the time the four of them make it to _The Light Spear,_ the bioluminescent street lamps glowing a soft green with the alien algae inside their tanks. There’s a road, of course, and Deadlock and Hot Rod could have driven, but instead they walk along the pavement beside Torsk and Yennu, and let them lead the way.

The inside of the oil house is atmospherically dim, a bar taking up half the space and a table area the other half, a small stage with inbuilt speakers in one corner. There’s no musician there today, but Hot Rod can see a timetable for them on the noticeboard next to the front doors. Every fourth day, it looks like.

It’s an oil house, so it’s primarily made for mechanoid species, though there are some scant organic-safe drinks offered alongside the wall of colourful tanks behind the bar, each with different fuels inside of them, some glowing, some not.

There’s no pure energon, but Cybertronian frames can process far more types of fuel than that – else they, as a race, really would be in a lot of trouble – so Hot Rod and Deadlock order a mid-grade fuel native to Kyga that they’ve had before. They’re sure it’s mildly inebriating to Kygonic systems, but it doesn’t translate those effects over to Cybertronian ones. Despite the relaxed atmosphere, and their willingness to have a good time, they’re not here to get drunk.

The bartender slides them their drinks in tall thin glasses, offering them a selection of flavouring sticks to stir in. Deadlock takes the magnesium one, Hot Rod the iron one – “What? Iron is classic!” he says at Deadlock’s look – and they return to the corner booth that Yennu has claimed while Torsk chats with the other bartender, clearly familiar with them already.

Yennu smiles at them, fiddling with a coaster. By now, both of them have become aware that Yennu is just quiet in general, so Hot Rod plucks up the small menu card while Deadlock roves his optics around the room, calculating the exits and entrances, pinching edge of the table between his fingers and trying to determine whether the thickness of the metal would hold up to laser-fire enough to make an effective cover if the need arose. He’s hoping it won’t, of course, but he can’t take any chances with Hot Rod’s safety, no matter how slim.

_/ Relax, /_ Hot Rod pings him on their private comm channel. _/ It’s gonna be fine. /_

_/ I’ll relax when I’ve got an exit strategy sitting in my tactical unit ready for potential implementation, /_ Deadlock answers. Hot Rod doesn’t say anything back, letting out a small sigh, but the pulse along the spark-bond is more understanding than irritated, so Deadlock doesn’t take it personally. It’s more a wish that they don’t need to that rakes at Hot Rod, and he gets that. It’s not like he doesn’t wish for those simpler days back, too. If scrounging around the gang war zone that was the Dead End could be considered _simpler._

Torsk bustles back to the table with a vivid neon blue drink in a low, round tumbler in one hand and a layered green-white-gold cocktail in a tall flute in the other. Yennu takes the cocktail with a smile, dunking the disc of soft lithium that came attached to the edge of the glass in with a careful hand, swirling it around with a single finger as it dissolves.

Torsk slides into the seat next to her and takes a sip before she speaks. “So, Fireglow, Quickdraw, what do you do?”

“Bounty hunting,” Deadlock says, blandly. His optics are focused, though.

“… Huh,” Torsk says, her optics widening a little but her voice pretty steady after she takes a moment to absorb that. “Hard work,” she nods. “With the office down in Tol’z, I assume?”

Hot Rod nods, his spoiler wings loosening a little from where they’d been tensed. Most don’t like hearing they’re sharing a table with what are essentially contract killers, no matter that their contracts are approved and licensed by Cam O’ek and its neighbouring systems. “Yeah.”

Yennu hums lightly, and the note her vocaliser holds is lovely. “I am an actor,” she says, “sometimes I perform in opera, as well. I sing. Lots of traditional Cam-Kyga plays are musicals.”

Torsk grins. “I’m the racer,” she says. “But I think that has a different meaning to you two than it does me.” She trails her optics over their transformation kibble again, clearly trying not to stare, but curious still. “Did either of you ever…?”

“I did some stuff on the tracks,” Hot Rod confirms, “though it was only a part of my job. Quickdraw didn’t.” His tone is polite, but doesn’t invite further questioning. Torsk tilts her head, but moves on to the next topic of conversation, something about a local racing star neither of them have heard of and their latest promotional efforts for younger racers.

Torsk and Hot Rod do most of the talking, and after a while, Deadlock turns to Yennu and asks, “What sort of plays would you recommend two strangers to the shared Cam-Kyga culture to go see?”

Yennu’s helm fins curl in thought and she hums a little, her vocaliser absolutely that of an opera singer. “The Three Valleys Cinema-Theatre is putting on _Seven Stars_ at the moment,” she says slowly, “but that requires more understanding of Kyga cultural history than I think you will have.” She takes a sip, her optics dimming gently, thoughtful. “After, it will be _Erbe and Yuna,_ though, for the Moon Festival. That one is an annual tradition, and will be accessible to a wider audience.”

“ _Erbe and Yuna?”_ Deadlock asks. “The two moons?”

Yennu nods, a small smile on her face. “They are folkloric figures, popular ones,” she says. “Erbe was a Cam-Okeo, and Yuna a Kygon. They fell in love with each other, married, and had a variety of adventures.”

She takes another sip from her glass, glances at Torsk and Hot Rod – still deep in their own conversation, which has now moved on to the mechanimals native to Kyga – before she elaborates more to Deadlock. “The Moon Festival celebrates their final story: Yuna gets kidnapped by Yurr’kirunn, a black hole brought to life by the warlock Pyra'kirunn. He seeks to eat everything in the universe, and he hates love and tries to destroy it whenever he comes across it, because love is selfless, and he knows only greed and gluttony. Erbe goes to the heart of the star they swore their love upon, forges a spear made of starlight, and drives off Yurr’kirunn.”

Yennu sighs here, mournful, and continues, “She is too late to save Yuna, though, and her tears crystallise and solidify around her and her wife, and they float into space and become Cam O’ek’s two moons. The Moon Festival celebrates their life together, with the reminder that evil can be driven off by love, even when it ends sadly. It is beautiful to see on the stage.”

Deadlock hums thoughtfully. “Perhaps we will be back in time to see it,” he says. He would like to be, anyway, but sometimes these things are outside of his control. “I will keep it in mind.”

Yennu smiles at him, and shifts her optics back to her wife, Torsk’s glass mostly drained. “She is excitable,” she says fondly to Deadlock, “but _such_ a lightweight. One glass and already she is tipsy.”

“Hey!” Torsk protests. “Spend less, get the same effect. Don’t know what there is to complain about!” A chuckle circles the table, but when she goes back up to the bar, Torsk orders a non-inhibitive coolant drink instead of whatever it was that she had before.

By the end of another hour, it is getting more crowded and more noisy inside _The Light Spear,_ and Hot Rod and Deadlock are getting a little more anxious to get back to their ship. Not that they haven’t had a pleasant evening, but loud, crowded and unfamiliar are now all things that do the opposite of facilitating relaxation.

“We should get going,” Deadlock prompts politely when Torsk begins to crane her neck cables to look at the wall of fuel tanks behind the bar once again, “we leave dock tomorrow.”

Hot Rod nods, grins, and says, “Thanks for the company. It’s been fun.”

Torsk blows a kiss their direction when Deadlock and Hot Rod get up from the table, Deadlock already reaching into his subspace to pull out his credit chip to pay their tab. “You sure you wanna make the trek to the docks?” she asks. “You can come spend a nice night at our place, if you like.”

Yennu’s bio-lights flush an embarrassed pink while Deadlock and Hot Rod pause in place a moment. “Torsk!” she chides. “Too soon, love.”

Torsk grins unrepentantly. “No strings offer,” she says. “And no pressure, obviously. You two are great company – hit us up next time you’re on Erbe, Fireglow’s got my comm. I think we could be good friends.” She looks up at them. “Yes? No? Not tonight?”

Hot Rod flexes his spoiler wings a little. “No, thank you,” he answers for both of them. “We’ve – never talked about that kind of thing, an’ now’s kinda not the time to do it. But, yeah, I’ll give you a call when we’re here next." He smiles at them. "Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Deadlock echoes his mate, answered in chorus by Torsk and Yennu. He goes up to pay, and in a matter of minutes, he and Hot Rod are stepping out into the cool night air, the chatter of the oil house muffling behind them as they close the doors.

“They were nice mecha,” Hot Rod says as they begin the trek back to the docks, following the map of the colony in their HUDs.

Deadlock nods in agreement. “They were,” he agrees. “Torsk is – quite forward, isn’t she?”

Hot Rod hums and nods, flicking one spoiler wing in an affirmative. “Yeah, she’s not shy. But, like, I don’t think she has a mean strut in her frame. She does a lot of charity work – the tracks here have youth groups an’ stuff that they run. I’m more flattered than anythin’, I think." He shrugs. "She looked, but – people always look, an’ I know how it feels when they’re sizin’ me up like a slice of oil cake an’ when they’re not. She weren’t. You?”

“I’m not bothered by the looking either,” Deadlock says, plucking an agreement with everything Hot Rod just said down the bond, “but I – ” He cuts himself off.

Hot Rod glances at him as they round a corner, a knowing smirk on his face. “Go on,” he coaxes, “you what?”

“It’s – ugly,” Deadlock avoids, pushing the feeling down.

Hot Rod snorts. “Go on,” he says again, this time challenging. “You’re _my_ spark-mate – so am I not yours and only _yours?”_ He smirks at Deadlock.

Deadlock growls, low in his engine. “No one gets to touch you but _me,”_ he says, possessively. His spark pulses it along the bond, curling hot against his mate’s spark.

Hot Rod laughs, not quietening it since it’s not really _that_ late. “That’s more like it,” he says. “I love it when you get like that.”

Deadlock huffs. “I think you feed into it,” he half-complains. “You say stuff like _mark me up_ and _prove I’m yours_ and every line of base-coding in me just goes from zero to one hundred in an astro-second.”

Hot Rod pauses. “Does it bother you?” he asks, now more serious.

Deadlock considers. “Not really,” he says slowly. “I don’t feel like I couldn’t control it, it’s not like that, it’s just – I never used to really be that possessive of lovers. Though, being fair, I never exactly had a string of romantic relationships. All the ones I ‘faced with who I felt things for were far more my _friends_ than anything – proof of life, comfort, and all that.”

He rolls in shoulder pauldrons back in thought, the two of them crossing a silent road. “It’s just – new, I suppose, but you’re my spark-mate, we _share our sparks._ I guess that comes with a certain amount of _we belong to each other_ that doesn’t really exist on the same level with other people.”

Hot Rod nods. “If you get to be not happy with it, tell me right away,” he says, “but until then, I’m yours, an' _you’re mine,_ you hear me?”

Deadlock shudders a little, warmth blossoming in his spark, some thrill at both claiming and _being claimed_ curling in him, hot and dark. “Yeah,” he says, fangs flashing in the green light of the bioluminescent street lamps. “Yours.”

Hot Rod takes his hand, twining their fingers together, and they continue their walk back to the _Luminary._ Above, in the sky, Yuna is a clear reflective silver, and the city lights of Cam O’ek stretch like a map of stars below.

**Author's Note:**

> Please enjoy this piece of slice-of-life fluff. I'm so proud of these two for finally making some friends. I also give no apologies for the excessive amount of cultural worldbuilding. 
> 
> Also, I didn't realise that Yennu was basically a robo-Twi'lek until like 3/4 of the way through this. Oh well. 
> 
> I can also be found on [tumblr](https://stairre.tumblr.com/). Come and say hello!


End file.
